QUEBEC – In what is being described as a successful test of a new federal law protecting journalistic sources, two Quebec reporters have been exempted from testifying in a case revolving around leaks at Quebec’s anti-corruption unit.

Quebec Court Judge André Perreault ruled Monday that Radio-Canada journalist Marie-Maude Denis and Cogeco-L’actualité journalist Louis Lacroix will not have to testify in a legal challenge in the corruption case against Nathalie Normandeau and Marc-Yvan Côté.

The judge said that while the identity of the journalistic sources in question would be “pertinent” to the case, lawyers acting on behalf of the two former Liberal ministers did not present sufficiently convincing arguments to force Denis and Lacroix onto the stand.

“The parties did not demonstrate that the administration of justice supersedes the public’s interest in preserving journalistic sources,” Perreault said, reading passages from his 35-page ruling handed down Monday.

He noted new federal legislation sets out certain strict conditions for such a procedure to go ahead and the lawyers failed to prove this is one of them.

The media lawyer representing Denis and Lacroix said the ruling means new federal legislation on the protection of journalistic sources has passed a first test in the courts. The new law, S-231, was adopted in October 2017.

This case will create a precedent in Canada, said media lawyer Christian Leblanc.

“It is in fact the first time in Canadian judicial history that we apply the federal law on the protection of sources,” Leblanc told reporters following the judge’s decision.

“There is always pressure on journalists to reveal their sources; the good news is we have an instrument to protect them and today is a good example of that. Here is the law applied for the first time, and this is very encouraging.”

Jacques Larochelle, the lawyer representing Côté in the case, told the judge he would review the ruling and decide about a possible appeal later. He has 10 days to act.

Larochelle is the lawyer handling the two legal challenges in the case against Normandeau, Côté and four others, which is supposed to start in April.

The six are charged with 14 counts of fraud and corruption.

The defence lawyers are trying to have the case against their clients dismissed on the grounds the numerous leaks have compromised their chance for a fair trial.

The lawyers wanted to put the journalists on the stand and question them on their confidential sources used to produce two reports about leaks from the province’s troubled anti-corruption unit, Unité permanente anticorruption, or UPAC.

Their stated goal was to demonstrate the existence of an organized system of leaks that, they say, justify a stay of proceedings against their clients. Part of their plan was to question journalists who made use of or exposed leaks from UPAC in the last months.

Denis, who works at Radio-Canada’s flagship investigative show Enquête, produced several reports, including one exposing connections between a firm called Premier Tech and former cabinet minister Sam Hamad and Côté. The story made abundant use of confidential sources.

Lacroix produced an article for L’actualité magazine under the headline “Qui veut faire dérailler le procès Nathalie Normandeau” in April 2016, three weeks after UPAC arrested Normandeau on the same day as the provincial budget was being tabled.

One of Lacroix’s sources was the mysterious “Pierre,” who claimed to have confidential information on the cases and tried to peddle it to several media outlets, facts Lacroix reported.

But lawyers acting on behalf of the media employing the journalists argued journalists do not work for police or the courts.

The judge’s ruling means Quebecers are no further ahead in identifying who is leaking information at UPAC and for what reasons. Politically charged, the story now is bouncing daily between the courts and the National Assembly.

All four have taken the stand in the Normandeau-Côté case. All four have denied anything to do with the leaks. Nobody has been charged in connection with the leaks.

On Sunday, Zambito added another layer to the mystery, accusing UPAC itself of having orchestrated the leaks. He said he believes the people responsible work in upper management at UPAC, including current UPAC commissioner Robert Lafrenière.

And he said the reason UPAC is trying to chase down the source of its leaks is because its probe involving former premier Jean Charest and former Liberal financier Marc Bibeau has reached a dead end.

The leaks have Premier Philippe Couillard’s Liberal government on the defensive over the apparent dysfunction at UPAC. Its answer has been to beef up a piece of legislation designed to make UPAC into a veritable independent police force, Bill 107.

Among other things, the bill creates a surveillance committee for UPAC. Stalled for weeks by an opposition filibuster, the bill this week is to take another step toward becoming law when MNAs vote on it for the second-to-last time.

They are to vote on the consideration of a committee’s report into the proposed legislation.

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